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HIST 116: World History since 1500: Books

How to Search for Books @ WIU

WestCat Basic Search
Allows you to search the books and videos at the Malpass Library plus the Music, Curriculum, and Quad Cities libraries.

  • Source type:  Specify a specific type of source such as book, video, dissertation, or map.
  • Search word treatment: Tell WestCat whether you want to...
    • simply find all the listed words in no particular order
    • find them as a phrase, or
    • search for them where they would appear alphabetically
  • Search type: Specify whether you want to find your words as part of the title, subject heading, author, or elsewhere.
 

Other search options such as ISBN are available under the Advanced search link to the right.

Don't find what you need at WIU? Change the search scope from WestCat to the I-Share Catalog tab to search our state system of 90+ libraries.

WorldCat

WorldCat (FirstSearch)
A giant database of more than 179 million records for any type of material cataloged by member libraries. Includes manuscripts written as early as the 12th century. Using this tool, you will be able to tap into a huge amount of bibliographic information, including many historical documents. Use the Library of Congress Subject Headings to refine searches. To find primary sources, use the subject headings "sources."

Where are the Books?



Where do I go once I have
the book's call number?

Main Library
Call Number Location
A-DA 4th Level
DB-GN
GR-HJ
HM-LB
LC-PQ		 5th Level
PR-PS
PT-QK
QL-Z		 6th Level

 

Subject Headings Defined

Subject headings are a controlled vocabulary. A single term or phrase is determined by an authority (Library Congress or a database vendor) to describe a subject. For example, try searching for the subject "roaring twenties" in West-Cat and see what you get.

Controlled Vocabulary Defined

A controlled vocabulary is a list of of predefined, authorized terms that have been selected by the designer of the vocabulary. Natural language vocabularies occur where there is no restriction on the words used.